The extraordinary rebound in Australian house prices continues with CoreLogic’s daily dwelling values index rising by 0.19% in the week ended 16 March:
It was the largest weekly increase in dwelling values since 13 January 2022.
The weekly increase was again led by Sydney where values rose by 0.34%, with Melbourne (+0.07%), Brisbane (+0.11%) and Perth (+0.14%) also recording rises:
Over the first 16 days of March, home values have increased by 0.31% at the 5-city aggregate level, with Sydney (+0.54%), Melbourne (+0.22%) and Perth (+0.18%) driving the growth:
Quarterly losses have also decelerated to only 1.3% at the 5-city aggregate level, with the pace of decline slowing sharply across Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane:
Finally, the peak-to-trough decline has fallen to -9.6%. Most interestingly, Sydney’s losses have fallen from -14.0% near the beginning of February to 13.2% currently:
The next chart tracking dwelling values as a time series shows more clearly the sharp rebound across Sydney, as well as the smaller rebounds across Melbourne and Brisbane:
Thus, for now the positive price impacts from the dearth of listings, record immigration and soaring rents are outmuscling the negative influence of rising mortgage rates and falling borrowing capacity.
Whether the rebound persists remains to be seen given the RBA could lift rates further and the pending fixed rate mortgage cliff.
